Boulder – Four years ago, Calais Campbell expected to play college football at a Front Range school.
At the end of his junior year at South High School, Campbell was leaning toward heading to Fort Collins to join his brother, Ciarre, at Colorado State.
But then something extraordinary happened.
He got a phone call from the University of Miami.
“It would have been cool to play with my brother, but I couldn’t turn down Miami,” Campbell said. “It was like a dream come true. Every kid wants to play on a team like this. The nationally televised games, the chance to play for a national championship, a lot of players going to the NFL.”
And now, as a redshirt freshman defensive end for the Hurricanes, who play Colorado at the Orange Bowl on Saturday, Campbell is getting that chance. At South, he was a standout in football, basketball and track. He recorded a combined 227 tackles, 38 sacks, five touchdowns off blocked kicks and fumble returns, and two interceptions during his junior and senior seasons.
As he compiled those numbers, not only Miami came calling. So did Michigan and Michigan State, he said.
“I didn’t even know they knew about me,” Campbell said.
But he had settled on Miami, and the atmosphere of excellence, former players returning to mentor and lend support, and grooming for the NFL has made him certain he made the right choice.
Colorado secondary coach Craig Bray calls Miami “the premier program in college football” since the late 1980s.
“It’s not one of the premier programs, it’s the premier program if you look at what they’ve done since 1988 or ’87,” Bray said. “Nobody else has done that.”
Campbell will not disagree.
But his focus is on showing Miami coaches they made a solid choice in signing him. After playing his first collegiate game at Florida State, Campbell mostly sat during the Hurricanes’ 36-30, triple-overtime win at Clemson. This week, he has been assured his playing time will increase against a CU team that Miami coach Larry Coker described Wednesday as “outstanding.”
“This has almost turned into an NFL-type schedule where you can’t catch your breath,” Coker said. “You play the Oakland Raiders, you play the Carolina Panthers, now you play the New England Patriots. They are 2-0, the Big 12 North champions from a year ago, they are predicted to be the Big 12 North champions again this year. We’ve got a tremendous challenge ahead of us.”
Miami (1-1) saw improvement in its offensive play last week against Clemson and is expecting the same against the Buffs. After an up-and-down season opener against the Seminoles, the Hurricanes simplified things offensively against the Tigers and sophomore quarterback Kyle Wright flourished.
“Just over the last couple of weeks, we improved a lot,” Campbell said. “The defense, we’ve been ready for a while. But the offense has been getting more comfortable in game situations. Now we practice much faster, got the tempo going like game tempo. I feel like everyone is playing more as a team.”
And on playing against CU?
“I’m really excited,” Campbell said. “It’s kind of crazy because it was my favorite school, and now I have to compete against them. But it’s cool.”
Staff writer Chris Dempsey can be reached at 303-820-5455 or cdempsey@denverpost.com.
